Things You Swore You’d Never Say To Your Kids

Remember all those ridiculous and tedious expressions that used to fly out of your parents’ mouths, usually as they looked as though they would rather sit in a confined space with Arthur Scargill than deal with you for another second ?

You’d roll your eyes and swear that once you’d married Morten Harket* and had the mini Harkets, you would never ever say such stupid things to your offspring (they probably wouldn’t translate well into Norwegian anyway).

Well, guess what? You now find them flying out of your mouth with gay abandon at moments of desperation.

How on earth did this happen…?

Oooh he’s a bit of alright.

A bit of alright? Jeez, you thought that was a phrase from the Middle Ages when your mum used to say it, usually in reference to Jim Robinson* when she would annoyingly interrupt an episode of Neighbours to offer you a post-school Tunnock’s Snowball and a squash, and suggest Jim was a sort. Eurgh, gross.

But you’re at it yourself. Ogling the old guys. It doesn’t matter that they were super-hot twenty years ago. Your kids won’t believe you. They’re still ‘dad’ guys now.

Leonardo*, Brad*, George*, Philip (Schofield)*. You swoon when Johnny Depp* appears on Pirates of the Caribbean. Your daughter looks like she’s going to puke and says he looks like Grandpa in a bandana. (He really doesn’t, sorry Dad).

When we were young, we didn’t have screens. We used to play OUTSIDE.

It seems all your kids want to do with their lives is to mindlessly stare at screens.

iPads, iPhones, any type of iThing, they’re not fussy. And the minute you take the screen away from them all you hear are the whines of “I’m booooooored.”

It infuriates you that they just don’t seem to know what to do with themselves.

You used to play outside for hours on end with nothing but a Space Hopper to keep you entertained (you omit the fact that you used to fight over whose turn it was on the Speak and Spell because it had buttons and made bleepy noises).

But you, too, would roll your eyes when your parents used to drone on about fresh air and playing in the street as they’d reprimand you for mindlessly playing on your Donkey Kong.

They were happy playing outside with spinning tops all day apparently.

You’ll get square eyes.

This one would probably be an add-on to the above rant. But, I mean, really? How ridiculous is this statement?

No matter how ludicrous, you find yourself saying it. Granted your kids have been on Minecraft for eight hours straight but still, their eyes are really, really not going to turn square.

You did, however, actually used to check if your eyes had gone square, after watching a marathon session of Grange Hill, Blue Peter AND Newsround, or worse still after ‘videoing’ a couple of Dynastys and watching them back to back.

Yup, still definitely eye-shaped. Phew.

You’re not going out like that!

Omg, did that really just come out of your mouth?

You can’t help it, it’s the topknot, the cropped top, the Adidas everything. Vicky Pollard is springing to mind. What’s wrong with the pretty Dorothy dress and matching bow that you just happened to suggestively lay out on your daughter’s bed?

Your mum used to look close to tears when you appeared in your latest Tammy Girl* ensemble: puffball over leggings, batwing jumper, tucker boots and a mullet that would give Limahl a run for his money. So cool.

But by jings, you hated it when your mum uttered those words, and your kids hate it just as much. In fact, you hate yourself for saying it.

Did you know there are starving kids in the world?

This is sadly as true today as it was in 1984, but it didn’t make you want to eat your mum’s beef stew anymore than it makes your kids want to eat your bolognaise, which one child has just announced ‘isn’t the best.’

It was those three words that has led you to irately screech the starving kids line. You can see your little ten year old self, perched on your shoulder shaking her head in disappointment, muttering “I can’t believe you just said that, you traitor you…”

They don’t make proper music anymore. Not like in my day, when they could actually sing.

Ok, perhaps this is a little far-fetched as the likes of Morrissey and Liam Gallagher aren’t exactly known for their beautiful, tuneful voices, but at least their lyrics meant something.

It’s hard for you to find soul-searching anarchy in the words “Shut Up and Dance with Me.” To you, those words don’t mean anything.

But they do to your kids. Just as ‘Pass the Dutchie on the Left Hand Side’ did to you, and your parents ignorantly dismissed such legendary words as utter nonsense.

Surely everybody in the world (except your OAP mum and dad) knew what ‘pass the dutchie on the left hand side’ meant.

Didn’t they?

You kids don’t know you’re born.

What does that even mean anyway? It doesn’t make anymore sense today than it did thirty years ago.

And yes, they do know they’re born, by the way, because they’re here, standing right in front of you, pushing all your buttons, causing you to come out with this ridiculous line because they’ve asked you yet again for the iPhone X because ‘like EVERYBODY in the world has one except me’.

You thought it was a stupid line when your parents used to say it, usually when you asked yet again for a ZX Spectrum because ‘EVERYONE in the world has one except me and they can play Frogger AND Pac-man.’

And it still is a stupid line but it will probably be used by parents for the next thirty years, as will all of the above.

Just wait till you hear your kids coming out with some of these chestnuts to their children. What goes around comes around as they say.

For all Mr S.H.I.T.s:

*Morten Harket may be replaced with Debbie Gibson, Belinda Carlisle, Tiffany or any 1980’s female singer that takes your fancy

*Jim Robinson may be replaced with Helen Daniels or Mrs Mangel, though the likelihood of your dad ogling those two characters is low

*Leonardo – Julia

*Brad – Jennifer (just coincidence)

*George – Penelope

*Philip – Lorraine (Kelly)

*Johnny Depp – Sharon Stone

*Tammy Girl may be replaced with Top Man, or perhaps just a shell suit.